Blind Rage (29 page)

“Had other fish to fry,” Helen mumbled. “My husband was sick. Had to be here to take care of him. Got a night job on an office cleaning crew so I could be with George during the day.”

“I didn’t know,” Tess said, hanging her head.

“I’m sure there’s a lot you don’t know,” Helen said. “I knew you had your own troubles. Didn’t want to burden you with mine.”

“You recommended Rosa to Alice,” I said. “How did you know her?”

Helen leaned forward and peered at me again. “And just who are you, exactly?”

“Oliver,” Tess said. “He’s my assistant, and I want to know the answer to that, too.”

“I didn’t know her,” Helen said. “I heard about her from someone. I don’t remember who.”

“Rosa’s gone,” Tess said.

Helen looked at her sharply, but her face quickly softened into a bland mask. “Sorry she didn’t work out. What’s it to me? You and Alice going to blame me for recommending her?”

“Not at all,” Tess said. “We just want to know who told you to suggest her.”

Helen drew herself up in the chair, but it still dwarfed her. “No one. I heard she was a good cook, so I passed on her name. Didn’t want to leave Alice in the lurch, that’s all.”

“Rosa tried to kill Alice. And Tess.” I gauged her reaction. Her mouth tightened, and fear crept back into her eyes. “Look, Helen, Rosa’s gone. Alice and Yoshi chased her off, along with a couple of goons. But whoever sent them won’t stop there. Tess is in danger. We need to know
who
told you to quit and let Rosa have your job.”

She shook her head, jaw clamped tight.

Tess tipped her head to one side, reading into Helen’s silence.

“Helen? Please. Why would you lie? Do you hate me so much you want to see me dead?”

Helen blanched again. “I don’t hate you, child. I just can’t tell.”

“They threatened you,” I said.

Helen nodded. “Me, my family.”

“We have to stop them,” I said. “I won’t let them do to Tess what they did to her parents. You have to help us, Helen. Who threatened you?”

A tear leaked from the corner of her eye. “They said they’d kill us all. George first, then my daughter Harriett, and me last if I didn’t do what they said.”

I looked around. “Where is your husband, ma’am?”

Sadness washed over her. “He died. Bad heart. I told you, he was sick.”

“I’m so sorry,” Tess said. “You must feel awful. Was it recent?”

“Must’ve been six months ago. Hard to say—the days just blend into each other.”

“You’ve been alone all this time?” Tess cried. “That’s terrible.”

Helen shrugged. “It’s not so bad. You get used to it. Gave me a chance to think. After taking care of you folks all those years, and then George, I hardly had time to myself. Been catching up on some reading.”

I heard a noise from the kitchen, like the creak of a floorboard, but when I glanced through the open door I saw nothing. Helen didn’t seem to take notice.

Tess’s face brightened. “You should come home with us. Now that Rosa’s gone, we need you, Helen.”

“Oh, I couldn’t,” Helen said. Color rose in her cheeks. “Don’t need no charity, now. I’m doing just fine.”

“No, really,” Tess said. “We
do
need you. You cook so much better than Alice.”

“Don’t let her hear you say that, child. Goodness, she’ll ground you till you’re gray.”

“I’m sorry about your husband, too,” I said softly, trying to bring the conversation back on point. “But if he’s gone, then maybe it’s time to undo the lie. We need a name, Helen.”

She stiffened, then slowly settled deeper into the chair as she considered what I said.

“It might just be time,” she said. “Lord knows Harriett has no use for me anymore. Stood by her when she went through a bad patch with her husband, but they’re divorced now, and she hardly speaks to me.”

She heaved a sigh and stared at me. I leaned forward expectantly, elbows on my knees. Her mouth opened, but what came out was a loud
pop-pop-pop
like firecrackers going off, and a red flower bloomed on Helen’s chest, quickly staining the front of her dress a deep claret. Without thinking, I dove sideways for the floor, hooking an arm around Tess’s shoulders as I went and bringing her with me. Tess cried in fright and pain as we crashed hard. The bang of a slamming door made me twist and look back toward the kitchen—just in time to see a dark shape flash past the window and disappear.

I scrambled to my feet and pulled Tess up off the floor. “Come on,” I growled. “We have to get out of here.”

“What’s going on?” she trilled. “What happened?”

I practically dragged her to the front door. “Someone just shot Helen. She’s dead. We’ve gotta go. Come on!”

She got her feet under her and hurried up the walk to the street alongside me. I craned my neck one way and the other to try and spot the intruder, expecting the same quick fusillade of bullets to find both Tess and me any second. Across the street, Luis tumbled out of the SUV and hurried toward us.

“Is she hurt?” he said.

“No, thank God.” I said.

He took Tess’s other arm and we hustled her toward the SUV. She stumbled along without protest, eyes glazed with shock.

“What happened?” he said. “I thought I heard shots.”

“Helen’s dead!” Tess said as we pushed her into the backseat.

“Who’s Helen?” Luis said.

“Former cook,” I told him. “She used to work for the Barretts. We came to ask her some questions.” I leaned in and helped buckle Tess’s seatbelt, then noticed that the vehicle was empty. I turned and faced Luis. “Where’s Kenny?”

He lifted his shoulders and let them drop. “I don’t know. We got here, parked, waited a minute. He said he was going to check on you two. Headed up the street.”

“Hey!” a voice called. “What’s up?” Kenny jogged up the sidewalk from the corner.

“Where you been, man?” Luis said.

Kenny looked confused. “Taking a walk. Why?”

“The girl almost got herself killed, that’s why,” Luis said. “Come on, let’s move out.”

“What about the police?” I said. “We need to report this.”

Luis shook his head. “No cops, man. Come on, let’s go before someone sees us.”

I hurried to the rental car and got in, looking around to see if any curious eyes were watching from behind living room curtains. The street was deathly quiet. I climbed in and started the car, thoughts racing furiously, wondering if I’d just left Tess in even graver danger than she’d been in a few minutes earlier.

All the bodies squeezed into the den that Travis used as his home office spoke at once, trying to talk over each other. He couldn’t decide if the pandemonium was more like a Chinese fire drill or a clown car. He’d come home only moments earlier to find them all knotted around one of the SUVs in the courtyard like conspiracy theorists around a water cooler, looking both suspicious and guilty at the same time. His own antennae quivering, he’d herded them into the house to find out what was wrong. Now he faced them all from behind his desk and raised a hand. The squabbling continued unabated.

“Ten-hut!” he barked.

Luis and Kenny faced him and snapped to attention immediately. Tess and Oliver came around more slowly, their heated conversation diminishing in volume and belligerence until they both looked at him questioningly. The boy looked pale, shaken, and Travis couldn’t remember when he’d seen Tess so frightened.

“What the hell is going on?” he said.

For a time, no one spoke. The four eyed each other nervously.

Luis stepped forward. “These two were involved in a shooting.”

“Not involved,” Tess said quickly. “It wasn’t like we went out and shot someone. We just happened to have been there when—”

Travis cut her off. “Been
where
? Where the hell were you? You were supposed to be here, doing homework.”

“She needed a break,” Oliver said. “Some fresh air. We went for a drive.”

“And ended up at a shooting?”

“Alice okayed it,” Oliver said, color coming to his cheeks.

“You keep making it sound like we’re Bonnie and Clyde or something,” Tess said, her voice rising. “We didn’t shoot anybody, okay? We
witnessed
a shooting. Well, Oliver did. I didn’t see a
damn
thing.”

Travis held up his hand again to stop her before the tears brimming in her eyes spilled down her cheeks. “Watch your mouth, young lady. I get it. Tell me what happened, from the beginning.”

As Tess ran through the afternoon’s events Travis felt his pulse rise and his breathing grow shallow. He’d spent a year trying to relate to Tess as she kept mostly to her room, trying to coax her back to living at least a semblance of the life she’d had before the accident. Now, after just two days back in the real world, he could no longer seem to protect her.

I’m a trained assassin, a career soldier, and I can’t keep my own niece out of harm’s way
.

“Why on earth did you decide go talk to that woman?” Travis said when she finished.

“Because it didn’t make sense,” Tess said. “When we found out Rosa was—”

“No, I know all that,” Travis said. “I meant why did you go
alone
? Why didn’t you talk to me first?”

“Do I have to ask permission to do everything around here?” Tess cried.

“You do now!” Travis said, heat creeping up from under his collar. “I already talked to Cyrus Cooper about her. I was going to have him investigate her. You never should have tried to talk to her alone.”

“You didn’t even know her,” Tess shouted. “She was part of
my
family, not yours. You have no right telling me who I can and can’t talk to. You are
not
my parent.”

Travis stared at her, teeth clenched, while she got the anger out of her system. He wished he had a valve somewhere he could open to let off some of his own steam.

Finally silent, Tess stood motionless except for the tremor in her knees.

“Are you finished?” he said. She tossed her hair. He went on quietly. “I’m asking you to check with me or Alice or Marcus before you go anywhere. It’s to make sure you’re not putting yourself in danger. Obviously, there’s a threat out there to you, to all of us. It’s my job as your guardian—
not
your parent—to guard you, to keep you safe. I can’t do that if I don’t know where you are.”

He turned to Luis and Kenny. “And where the hell were you two in all this?”

Luis pinked and glanced at his feet. “I . . . We . . . We were parked across the street. We had an eye on the house, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary. The street was quiet. We saw the woman let the kids in the house. Figured she knew them. I thought everything was cool.”

Luis snuck a look at Kenny before turning his eyes back to Travis again. Kenny stayed ramrod straight, eyes ahead, no expression on his face.

“That how you remember it?” Travis asked him.

“No, sir. I left my post to walk up the street and get some air.”

“You left your . . . What the hell were you thinking?”

“What Luis already told you, sir. We saw the woman invite the kids in, so we figured they were safe for the time being. I thought as long as I didn’t go too far, I could spare a few minutes while they were inside. You didn’t tell us you were going to have the woman investigated.”

“Doesn’t matter. Your orders were to protect her. And Oliver. Consider your pay docked. Screw up again, and you’re gone. Got it?” He waited for Kenny’s nod. “You saw nothing?” Travis squinted at him with narrowed eyes.

Kenny put his hands out, palms up. “Not a thing, I swear. Just those two coming out of the house like it was haunted.”

“You didn’t hear shots fired?”

“No, sir. Nothing I could clearly identify as gunfire.”

Travis turned to Oliver. “I want every detail you can remember. Take your time.”

Oliver let his gaze drift up toward the ceiling as if seeing a movie projected there, and immediately began describing the scene—the contents of the room, their positions relative to each other, the woman’s demeanor. Travis listened without interruption, and was surprised at the level of detail. Most eyewitnesses to a crime, particularly a sudden and violent one, tended to focus on one or two things, forgetting or even unaware of other details. Their testimony was notoriously unreliable, yet juries still often believed more strongly in eyewitness accounts than other forensic evidence.

“And you never got a look at the shooter’s face?” Travis said when Oliver finished.

Oliver shook his head. “It happened so fast. He was out the back door before I had a chance to look.”

“The gunfire . . . You’re sure it was three shots?”

“Yeah, definitely three. Not like
bang
,
bang
,
bang
. More like
brat-tat-tat
. Fast.”

“And you say you could hear okay afterward?” Travis pressed.

Oliver nodded. “Sure. A little ringing in my ears, but the shots weren’t as loud as I thought they’d be in that small space. Like firecrackers—Black Cats. I thought a shot would be more like an M-80.”

Travis glanced at Luis and Kenny and saw his same realization reflected in their eyes.

“Assault rifle,” Travis said. “On semiautomatic. A three-round burst. Suppressed, too, from what Oliver described.” The two soldiers nodded in agreement. “That means military hardware, most likely. Someone didn’t want her talking. Which means she had something to say.”

“I told you,” Tess blurted. “She was about to give us the name of the person who forced her to quit. Someone scared her into recommending Rosa for the job. And now she’s dead! It isn’t fair!”

Travis heaved a sigh. “No, it isn’t fair. Neither is this, but you’re just going to have to live with it: You’re grounded. You go nowhere but here or school.”

“Why?” Tess cried. “I didn’t do anything!”

“You nearly got yourself killed!” Travis roared. “Again!”

“But Alice said I could—”

“Enough! I don’t care what Alice said. You’re grounded, and that’s it.”

“I hate you!” Tess shouted. “I wish you’d never come back! My parents would be alive if you hadn’t come back. I hate you!”

She whirled and stumbled for the door, waving her arms to feel her way. Travis wordlessly watched her go, pulse racing.